


Sequence Learning

by etoiledunord



Category: Heroes - Fandom
Genre: M/M, Mohinder with Powers, Non-Graphic Violence, Psychological Manipulation, Telekinesis
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-07-31
Updated: 2008-07-31
Packaged: 2017-10-25 19:57:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,976
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/274161
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/etoiledunord/pseuds/etoiledunord
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sylar wants to teach Mohinder.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sequence Learning

**Author's Note:**

> Written for frozenfoxfire on Livejournal for mylar_fic's Christmas in July 2008 exchange. She suggested using song lyrics as a prompt and requested powers!Mohinder and evil!Mohinder.
> 
> Thanks to ladywilde80 for being an awesome sounding board for this piece!
> 
> Psychic changes are born in your heart, entertain.  
> A nervous breakthrough that makes us the same, bless your heart.
> 
> Christ, I’m a sidewinder, I’m a California King.  
> I swear it’s everywhere, it’s everything.
> 
> -Red Hot Chili Peppers, _Parallel Universe_

It was dark in Mohinder’s apartment; the lights were off and the blinds were shut tight. Mohinder sat at the kitchen table, watching nervously as Sylar moved through the shadows, clearing an area in which he could work. From across the room, Mohinder could hear his voice, low and calm, explaining the situation.

“I can read people. Literally. When I take an ability, I see it written in the brain. I see how it works. It’s something only I can understand, a textbook from which only I can read. But using an ability is different. My perception allows me to know the ability, but I still have to learn how to use it. You’ve seen me struggle with that, Mohinder.”

“I have,” he replied quietly, remembering Sylar doubled over in pain from the sounds of simply driving down a highway.

“It’s a type of sequence learning,” Sylar said. “Mental dexterity is what’s required to master an ability—in fact, it’s all that’s required. Writing an ability into your brain isn’t a power in and of itself. Most anybody could learn to do the things that I do. The only reason they don’t is that they can’t read the abilities, can’t decipher the language in which they’re written. I, however, can translate that language into something other people can understand.”

Sylar stopped, then, and looked around at the space he’d created. Nodding, he said “This’ll do. Let’s get started, Mohinder.”

Getting up slowly, Mohinder made his way to the living room area where Sylar was standing. “Are you sure this is safe?” he asked.

“Trust me,” Sylar said with a smirk, “what I’m about to do isn’t dangerous at all.” With that, he moved around so that he was standing behind Mohinder with his chest in contact with the man’s back and put his hands on his shoulders.

“What are you doing?” Mohinder asked.

“Relax,” Sylar replied softly, running his palms down Mohinder’s arms to clasp his hands. He lifted their right hands into the air in front of Mohinder, like they were pointing at something. “It’ll be easier if you move with me. Now watch.”

With his hand, Sylar drew a line of burgundy light through the air. It glowed in the dark like some sort of ethereal sign, a gentle flux to the colour. “Use this as a reference point,” Sylar whispered in Mohinder’s ear. “I’m going to illustrate the components of the ability like this, and so long as you keep yourself centred on this line, everything’s golden.”

“Where did you-”

“This ability is one of my newer acquisitions,” Sylar answered before Mohinder could finish. “Nice, isn’t it?”

“I don’t think this-”

“Shh,” Sylar interrupted. He moved their hands again, this time drawing a line of green light tangential to the first. “Let me show you how to be strong.”

~~~

The pen rose from the table top and hovered uncertainly in midair for a moment before falling back down with a small clatter. Again. Mohinder gave a frustrated sigh.

“I don’t understand,” he said.

Sylar turned from where he had been standing by the kitchen table and paced a few steps away. “You’ve got to believe you can do it,” he insisted.

“Not that,” Mohinder replied irately. “Why did you teach me this—this ability?”

Sylar turned back to face Mohinder. “You don’t want it?” he asked with a smirk.

“Answer my question.”

With an amused shake of his head, Sylar replied “I taught it to you so that you could use it.”

“I am not in the mood for obtuse answers, Sylar,” Mohinder said, pinching the bridge of his nose. “What’s your real motivation?”

“That is my real motivation.”

“Fine,” Mohinder huffed, turning back to the pen. He concentrated, and it gave a feeble sort of flop before rolling away to the other side of the table. “You decided that I should play with pens,” he muttered under his breath.

“I heard that,” Sylar said. “And you’re not getting it quite right.” He looked at the pen and mentally lifted it up, standing it perfectly still for a moment before making it do a sort of tumbling act of flips and spins across the table, back to where Mohinder was sitting, then laying it down gently. “I taught you this ability so that you could use it however you were inclined.”

Mohinder rolled his eyes. “How helpful...”

~~~

It had now been three months and twelve days since Mohinder had last seen Sylar. He had no idea where the other man had disappeared to, and he’d refrained from talking to anyone about it, lest his colleagues realize that he’d been maintaining an almost-friendly relationship with the murderer. Sylar’s presence in Mohinder’s life encouraged secrecy. First he’d hid their working partnership, convinced that letting other people know would only complicate things, and now he was hiding the telekinetic power Sylar had given him.

In part, Mohinder was worried about the reaction he would get upon revealing that he had gained an ability. Would it cause others to lose trust in him? Would they put him in a cell and poke at him to see how it worked? Lurking somewhere beneath that worry, though, was the desire to keep this for himself. It was his own little secret, a talisman that gave him confidence and allowed him to peer into a world of power. He was very careful to avoid using his ability where others might interrupt him or be otherwise observing, but his practice in private had increased his skill greatly. Far from his first weak attempts at pen-floating, he could now move large objects with ease and grace, an accomplishment that pleased him. It was peculiar, but it somehow made Mohinder feel ready.

The atmosphere in the restaurant was jovial as the dozen or so people at the table toasted to Peter in celebration of his 28th birthday. The rise of the new Primatech from the ashes of the old Company had brought everybody here together in a way that felt very right, and while there were occasionally professional disagreements, one of the things they all agreed on was that Peter Petrelli deserved a happy birthday this year.

“If I could,” Mohinder started, standing up, holding his glass of wine. “Peter, I know things have been hard for you lately. In a way, they’ve been hard for all of us. But the hard work, support and faith you’ve put behind our efforts to make the world a better place for everyone are so very appreciated, and I know your brother would be proud. I can only hope that life rewards you properly for all that you’ve done. Happy birthday.”

There were cheers of agreement as everybody raised their glasses and drank. Peter, smiling widely, stood up as Mohinder sat down.

“Thank you, everybody,” Peter said. “I just have one thing to say, really. If it weren’t for all of-”

 _  
**BANG!**   
_

Every head in the restaurant turned in the direction of the noise. Near the entrance, two men were holding back the hostess while more poured in through the doors, which had been knocked off their hinges by the force with which they’d been thrown open. About twenty men entered and filed along the perimeter of the room, staring menacingly at the patrons. None of them were holding weapons. Once they were all in position and the two men holding the hostess had gone into the kitchen, another figure appeared in the doorway. Mohinder heard his companions gasp along with him.

“Sylar!” Peter shouted, running forward. Before he could take more than five steps, however, Sylar held out his hand and Peter fell over, unconscious.

There was a second of shocked silence before Bennet stood quickly, drawing his gun and shouting “Everybody down!” The people at the other tables screamed and ducked for cover, but the men against the walls moved in, coming straight for their table.

“No!” Mohinder yelled, raising his hands up and throwing the men in front of him telekinetically back against the wall. He turned around and did the same to the ones behind him, doing his best to ignore the sickening noises they made when they hit.

Whirling around to face Sylar, Mohinder could feel the blood pounding in his head. He was expecting to be attacked, or at least taunted or insulted, but Sylar did nothing but smile and nod for Mohinder to look behind him, where his colleagues were. It was then that Mohinder realized what he’d done.

And then everything went black.

~~~

When he came to, Mohinder was surprised to find that he was in his own apartment, lying on the bed. He was not surprised, however, to see Sylar enter the bedroom, an appraising sort of look on his face.

“What the hell was that?” Mohinder demanded, sitting up. He felt remarkably fine, considering that he’d recently been rendered unconscious somehow.

“I thought it was time that you owned up to what I’d made you,” Sylar replied.

Mohinder stared. “By attacking my friends and I in a public place?” he asked incredulously. “If you cared so much about what I did, especially in regards to an area of my life you were involved in, why did you disappear for more than three months?”

Sylar took a deep breath which he exhaled through his nose before answering. “I thought I’d done enough,” he said. “But the longer you went without admitting to anybody what you could do, the more I began to suspect you would never accept the power I’d given you. I knew you were practicing—and improving—but I was starting to think you might not be worthy of an ability.”

“Worthy?” Mohinder repeated, fuming. “You are in no position to decide my worth, Sylar. Now tell me what you did with the others before I kill you.”

“They’re fine,” Sylar said with a scoff. “I left them at the restaurant. Petrelli should be awake by now. But you managed to kill three of the men I brought with me.”

Shock ran through Mohinder’s body. He’d forgotten about the other men for a moment.

“Five others had concussions,” Sylar continued. “One had a rather serious spinal injury.”

“They deserved it, working with-”

“None of them had an ability,” Sylar interrupted. “No weapons, either. They were just hired men. I barely knew them. Are you sure they deserved it?”

“You sick bastard,” Mohinder breathed. “You meant for me to kill them.”

Sylar smirked. “You did really well, you know. I made you better than them, Mohinder, and today you showed that you understood your evolutionary imperative. It wasn’t that you wanted to do what you did, it was that you had to.”

Mohinder felt hot behind the eyes. “This was not evolutionary imperative. This was you threatening my friends and I because there is something deeply wrong with you.”

“I could make you better, still,” Sylar said. “If you prove to me that you deserve it.” Sylar sat down on the edge of the bed and reached for Mohinder’s face, running his index finger lightly down the other man’s cheek. “I’ll be watching you, Mohinder, and if you do anything else as impressive as what you did today, I’ll come back and teach you more.”

“Get out,” Mohinder seethed.

“For now, go back to your little gang of friends. Tell them whatever you want.” Sylar rose from the bed and walked back to the door before turning to look at Mohinder once more. “They’re too naive to recognize what I’ve done to you just yet, but it’s only a matter of time before they realize.”

With that, Sylar turned and left. Mohinder heard the front door open and close and the lock slide shut. In a burst of anger, he telekinetically threw the bedroom door shut before falling back and staring at the ceiling.

“No...”

 _Yes._


End file.
